The JULY 2016
Red Hook StarªRevue SOUTH BROOKLYN’S COMMUNITY NEWSPAPER
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Mermaids on display in Boerum Hill
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by Mary Staub
n the surface, Coney Island’s Mermaid Parade may seem like it is all about glitz and glam, costumes and crowds, pomp and personas. What has drawn Luke Ratray, a Carroll Gardens photographer, to the parade for the past twenty years, though, is the people behind those personas. Every year since 1996, Ratray has set up his old-fashioned film camera along the Coney Island boardwalk during the parade to find and capture the individuals behind these created identities. “The pageantry is fun, but not as interesting,” said Ratray. “The parade happens because people show up. It happens because people want it to happen. I’m more interested in the personality of those people.” The images that Ratray has shot of these people over the past twenty years are on view for the first time this summer, through July 24th, in “Coney Island Mermaids, 1996-2016” at the Boerum Hill gallery Urban Folk Art Gallery.
Some of the participants in the June 22 meeting; CGA founder Buddy Scotto is in the middle. (photo by George Fiala)
RED HOOK'S NEW TENANT UNION
Ratray’s great passion throughout his photographic career has always been for capturing people. People who create identities for themselves are of particular interest to him. These images often expose more about an individual than images of a person standing naked. “What’s funny is that someone who creates an identity for himself and becomes someone else often reveals more about them,” Ratray said the day before the exhibit’s opening reception last month. “They’re telling me more about who they are. My attempt is to always get someone to reveal something of them(continued on page 7)
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by George Fiala
rganized under the aegis of the Carroll Gardens Association (CGA), the Southwest Brooklyn Tenant Union held its inaugural meeting last month. The union is an outgrowth of the work of Ben Fuller-Googins, CGA Programming and Planning Director, and Manon Vergario, CGA Community Organizer. The duo had worked to organize tenants of 63 Tiffany Place, a failed luxury condo rehab that was turned into rent-stabilized units in 1995. Last year there were a number of tenant complaints, including rent overcharges, and they came to the CGA for help. After some success with the Tiffany Place residents, Fuller-Googins and Vergario realized a need for some sort of local organization to address similar issues that other residents in the area were facing in the midst of an ongoing gentrification. Fuller-Googins and Vergario's next step was to organize a “Know Your Rights” workshop, held at the Miccio Center on May 4. Flyers promised that participants would “learn about rent regulation laws and other housing code laws that protect tenants.” The flyer also said, “We will talk about our rights to quality repairs, and how to fight landlord harassment. Also, learn more about how you can get involved in the fight to grow COMMUNITY POWER to prevent displacement.”
Photos: Top Left, 1997, Women Blowing Bubbles; Top center: Mermaids 2008, Jenny Fisk cyclone costume on bridge: Top right: Mermaids 2002; above: Mermaids 2002, two women, roller skates, fish face, wings, goggles. Luke Ratray photos.
Red Hook Star-Revue
The workshop was well attended. At that meeting, someone suggested creating a permanent entity to address tenant rights, Vergario and Ben created a new flyer introducing a tenant union and armed with a list (continued on page 3)
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